A working barge motors past two pleasure palaces
moored off George Town, Grand Cayman.

Our second cruise of the Western Caribbean began
on 28 Nov. in Fort Lauderdale. Essentially, the itinerary went around
Cuba, with stops in the Bahamas, Jamaica, Grand Cayman and Mexico. We
were delighted to hear that George Town had been reinstated as a
destination. Because of hurricane damage, it had been replaced with
Key West as a cruise stop for several weeks. Although the areas we saw
on Grand Cayman all seemed to be in good repair, we were told by a
store clerk that only the tourist areas had been addressed, and it
would take 4 or 5 years to repair the heavy damage along the South
shore. Grand Cayman is our source of 12-year-old Tortuga rum, the
smoothest rum we've ever encountered.

Again we sailed with Holland America, the "Old
Folks Line" (it's hard to imagine they're owned by Carnival), on one of
their newest ships, the Oosterdam. Although service remains excellent,
we find that cruising has become an exercise in extracting as much money
as possible from the passengers. Everything is overpriced, from the
drinks to the shore tours, and HAL now follows the lead of other cruise
lines in adding a "gratuity" of US$10/passenger/day to your bill.

A serenade in the Oosterdam dining room

"Life is a beach"

A "Folkloric" show ashore in
Cozumel

Left: Caribbean sunrise, taken from
the verandah of our cabin.

It's
noticeable that the newer ships come with a much higher percentage of
verandah cabins, no doubt in response to passenger preference, and the
upcharge from an outside cabin appears to be slightly less.

We were fortunate with the weather, which was
excellent throughout the cruise. The hurricane season had just ended
and it was smooth sailing under sunny skies.

After a couple of days at home to
do laundry, we flew to Prince George to visit family. The above scene
is Sadler Drive, near the home we had during the 5 years we lived
there in exile. I had forgotten how much I dislike driving on ice and
packed snow.

This picture was taken near sunrise
from the road up Connaught Hill which leads to the picturesque campus
of UNBC. It was a chilly morning at -15C and there was fog in the
"bowl". That fog invariably contains strong hints that Prince George
remains very much a pulp mill town, with four kraft mills within the
city limits. Fortunately it's not like the old days when residents
derisively spoke of the smell of money. Foul condensate strippers, and
the collection and combustion of both concentrated and dilute
non-condensable gases at all the mills have vastly reduced low level
emissions of sulphurous compounds and improved the air shed quality.